California: Griffith Observatory

After a relaxing day letting the boys sleep and recover, we made a trip to the Griffith Observatory at sunset, which apparently is the most popular time to go. Ben had to wait awhile to find parking and ultimately ended up parking in a compact space. Which was amusing since he was in a Suburban. But the Observatory was really cool and the views were great. Again, the cool temperatures in the evening were so lovely.

California: urgent care + ice cream

We spent most of Saturday trying to find an urgent care that worked with our insurance, waiting at the urgent care to be treated, and trying to find a pharmacy that had the eyes drops we needed. Oliver and Simon both had fevers and conjunctivitis. Simon looked so awful. His eyes were pretty much glued shut, swollen, and red. Oliver also had an ear infection. We were bummed that our time with the Dyckmans was spent dealing with sick kids and that they didn't get to meet Simon in his normally happy state. It ended up being a weekend of recovery but we still enjoyed spending time together and catching up and relaxing. We lucked out and happened to be there for their annual "piggy dinner." They have all-you-can-eat ice cream for dinner to celebrate the first day of summer. It was so fun.

Pretty much Elsa's dream come true.

A nice walk around the neighborhood. Loved the cool California evenings.

California: Disneyland!

We were so excited to spend the weekend in L.A. with our dear friends the Dyckmans. Sarah and her kids met us at Disneyland the morning we arrived and it was so wonderful to be reunited. Amelia and Ethan have been friends since birth and it was so fun to see Jonah and finally meet Ivy. I was a little worried about how the day would go since we were going on only 3 hours of sleep and Simon's cold seemed to be getting worse. Both Oliver and Simon were screaming in the parking lot as we were getting ready to head into the park. It seemed like it would be a rough day, but once we got into the park, the boys settled down and it ended up being a great day. Sarah was amazing at navigating us through the craziness of it all. We started in California Adventure and then made our way to Disneyland. The girls loved every minute of it. It was Amelia's birthday so she enjoyed getting some extra attention throughout the day. Sarah worked her magic and we hardly had to wait in any lines at all. It was fantastic. 

Amelia really wanted a churro for her birthday.

Amelia is a huge rollercoaster fan.

Poor kid. His cold worsened to a fever and the worst case of conjunctivitis by the next day.

For some reason we were the only people sitting on this side of the street for the parade so we got lots of attention from the characters. It was sunny and hot but fun. 

Watching the fireworks as we waited for the parking shuttle. I didn't think we would last this long but we did! And we had a great time.

Oliver did not want to go on Splash Mountain again.

California: getting there

With air travel, it's not a matter of if something will go wrong, but when.

Our 6 p.m. flight out of Raleigh was delayed and we didn't leave until 9 p.m.

Flying with kids is probably my least favorite thing to do as a parent. Oliver and the girls are easy. They're old enough to be entertained by electronics and books but Simon is not. How do you entertain a 15-month-old in one tiny spot for 6 hours? You hope and pray they fall asleep.

We brought Simon's car seat on the plane and I'm so glad we did. Simon didn't actually have a seat so the car seat was technically for Oliver. As I suspected, Simon was super squirmy and there was no way he would fall asleep on our laps. So we stuck him in the car seat and he immediately turned his head and went to sleep. And we had Oliver sleep on our lap. Both boys slept through most of the flight to San Francisco. Simon had come down with a cold the day before we left which actually mellowed him out a bit. We were worried about this ear-piercing scream he does when he wants something (strangers often compare him to a pterodactyl) but he mostly kept his complaining to a sad whimper.

We finally arrived in San Francisco at midnight (3 a.m. Eastern time) and of course we had missed our connection to L.A. so we had to pay for a hotel. A hotel room which we used for 3 hours. We finally arrived in the room at 1 a.m. (4 a.m. Eastern) and had to painfully wake the kids up at 4 a.m. for our early flight to L.A. At least this time all of our luggage and car seats made it!

The rental car company did not have the minivan we reserved (of course) so they "upgraded" us to a Suburban. Super fun to drive around in big cities where parking is limited and even more fun to fill with gas at California prices. It was such a pain to load the kids in and out of it (I just can't get over the convenience of automatic sliding doors with kids) but they did love the dual DVD screens and we had plenty of cargo space.

After picking up our rental, we drove straight to Disneyland! Are we crazy? Maybe. (More on that later.)

But we survived and it could have been worse and the kids did really great on the flights. (Well, Simon and Oliver both screamed their heads off on the descent into L.A. but we later learned Oliver had an ear infection. Poor kid.)

Burning through all the airplane snacks while we wait for our flight in Raleigh.

Oliver at 4 a.m.

blog? what's that?

We just returned from an amazing road trip where we spent two weeks traveling 2,700 miles through 14 states and the most gorgeous scenery. The blog was pretty much abandoned for the summer and the idea of catching up is pretty painful (those summer months also included a trip to California and some fun summer theme weeks here at home). I'm pretty sure the three people that read this blog also follow my Instagram feed which is always current, and which makes it tempting to ditch the blog. But the New England scenery was too great not to document in more detail so back to blogging it is.

But first I need to savor these last few days of summer. Except that it's 92 degrees and awful outside. Take me back to those cool Vermont summer days...